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Wednesday, November 13, 2013

In which a book is reviewed

[[Uh, what? Two more followers? That's all kinds of awesome! Yay! And, welcome. And now, onto business :D ]]

I'm in a book reviewing spree.

Why?

I have a 4-month-old pup who's either
tearing out the foam from my govt-issued sofas or trying to pee on my
bed. That I get any reading done at all ought to be celebrated, and
publicly too. Because my pup has now decided that hanging out in the
balcony is a great idea because he can climb on the chair we've kept
for him and watch as cars and trucks drive-by, the cows graze (I live
in a village converted to an army cantonment, okay?) and people walk
past our block and go to the front gate. Thankfully, his watching
means I have time to read and write. So, here, for the followers of
my blog is a post about Hitched – The Modern Woman and Arranged
Marriage.

Written by Nandini
Krishnan, Hitched traces the “why?” behind the decision of
independent, educated, urban women to marry a man chosen for them by
their families. Now, I had an arranged marriage too and I have spoken
about it extensively online, but I did not just say yes to the first
goat my father introduced me to. There was a lot of talking/thinking
involved, and that is precisely what Nandini explores in her book.
How did these women arrive at the decision where you met a stranger
and decide that you were going to spend the rest of your life
co-habiting, procreating, money-sharing, secret-sharing,
life-building, etc?

The women featured
in Hitched have all lived life according to the rules they
made for themselves, and each of the women in the book has her own
reason as to why she married the man she married. Each woman owns the narrative of her marriage. Let me emphasise this – marriage, not wedding. For those
who are confused about the two, kindly do a quick search for the definition and come back here.

Arranged marriages
are a norm, in a manner of speaking, in this country. Now, those who are academic
will talk about the violence exerted by patriarchy by still keeping
this alive and the lack of choice and the fact that agency is robbed
when a partner is chosen for someone rather than them choosing their
partner. I would like to clarify that this book does not feature the
women on whom this institutional violence in committed. They are in
charge of the decision-making process, although the means to the
decision is either a marriage broker, or meddling relative, or an
online matrimonial website.

Now, the same
category of women – educated, urban, independent – also existed a
generation ago. Our mothers, I mean. They were the key veto in the
whole arranged marriage process, but let's face it, if our
grandfathers had insisted that a particular alliance go ahead, it
probably would have. I'm also pretty sure that most of our mothers
did not stay out till 3am and come back home to sleep off 10 tequila
shots!

Back to Hitched.
There's so much truth in here, and so much relevance that I was
thinking about everything I've written online and shared with my
friends about the morons I was being introduced to and asked to
consider by my dad. And even though it might seem that this is a
collection of identical stories, it's not. Even the people and their
values are not identical. There are all kinds of women featured here
– journalists, dancers, TV producers, divorcee,
still-looking-for-a-husband – and each of them has her own way of
talking about how her life panned out. And that's what makes this
book complete, if you ask me. The fact that this is not a collection
of “One fine day, I met this guy and we connected and just knew,
and then we got engaged and discovered how right out choice was, and
then we got married and are now living happily ever after. I was
right, he is “the one” and I'm so happy, I'm vomiting rainbows
every day.” There is crazy, there is poignant, there is also
methodical.

Another plus for
Hitched is that it is pieced together beautifully. First up are the
stories – from the disastrous first meetings, to the frustrations
and heartbreaks, et al – and following those are the questions “The
wedding hungama”, “What do couples fight about in the first
year?” and others. At some point, it might seem like you're reading
a relationship how-to, but that's not the aim of the book. Let's face
it, when you're talking about your marriage, it tends to go into
“Yeah, we fought, but relationships are about compromise...”
territory and that's something no one can really help. Especially in
India, where advice can be got for free for just about any life
crisis – from maths homework to childbirth! Let's also be clear
about another thing - when people talk about their marriages, they will
never tell you about the fights, the disappointments, the “did I
make the right decision moments” to anyone, best friend or no.

I recommend that
everyone read Hitched. Especially those who are from foreign
countries. God knows you harbour a ton of misconceptions about us!
I'd appreciate it if you understood that my country is a mix of people
you make documentaries about, as well as people like me, who blog and
whose blogs you read.